Unmanned vehicles, such as ground vehicles, air vehicles, surface vehicles, underwater vehicles, and spacecraft, have been developed for a wide range of applications including surveillance, search and rescue operations, exploration, and other fields. In some instances, unmanned vehicles may be equipped with a payload configured to collect data during flight. For example, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) may be equipped with cameras for aerial photography. A payload may be coupled to an unmanned vehicle via a gimbal mechanism that provides movement of the payload in one or more degrees of freedom.
However, existing gimbal mechanisms for payloads coupled to unmanned vehicles can be less than ideal. In some instances, the gimbal mechanism may comprise a serial mechanism wherein a motor of one stage becomes of load of another succeeding stage, which may not be optimal for minimizing the volume and weight of the gimbal mechanism. In some instances, the gimbal mechanism may provide less than ideal stability to the payload.